


The World Is Full of Petty Fools

by learningthetrees



Category: Slow West (2015)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-27
Updated: 2017-02-27
Packaged: 2018-09-27 04:34:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,414
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9965033
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/learningthetrees/pseuds/learningthetrees
Summary: He flexed his pointer finger, squeaking out a croak with each stretch. Kneeling down in front of the boy, Payne could practically feel Silas stiffen behind him. So maybe he was being a bit childish, a bit petty…but didn’t Silas deserve it?





	

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to an anon on Tumblr who requested this fic!

That bastard.

They were easy enough to find. Silas, not so much, but the boy made enough noise to track from half a mile off. He was always talking, or whistling, or trampling through the brush with absolutely no sense of discretion. He and the gang had been on the trail for a few days now, keeping their distance, but it soon became clear Silas knew they were there. He was playing with them.

Bastard.

So Payne made the decision without consulting or asking. He rounded up a bottle of absinthe, some glasses, and a few cigars and swaggered toward his charges’ makeshift camp. Maybe it was a shot in the dark.

It was Silas, after all.

He rattled the glasses a little to announce his presence, and when he emerged from the bushes, Silas’s gun and gaze were fixed on him.

Payne made a pirouette and held his arms aloft. He knew Silas’s overly cautious nature. _Nothing to see here_ , he might have said.

“May I enter?”

At first, he thought Silas would say nothing. But then he spoke in that low grunt of his that said he couldn’t care less. “Free country.”

“Try telling the Natives that.” He expected maybe a smirk at that, but alas, nothing. “I propose a trade.” Payne proffered the bottle. “Mug of coffee for the finest imported absinthe and a cigar of unrivaled quality.”

That’s when the boy spoke up. “We drink tea.”

Silas ignored the boy, and Payne followed suit. He set down the glasses and held out a cigar for Silas. The man obliged, looking amused as he accepted.

Then Payne turned to offer one to the kid. “One for you, young man.” The boy’s fingers twitched before he took the cigar, which made Payne grin. He took the warm tin cup the kid handed him and surveyed Silas.

It had been ten years since they’d had a proper conversation — although, you could hardly call it proper when one party had a gun aimed at the other and the other party was pretty damn sure the first would pull the trigger without hesitation.

Ten years, and even though his face was a little older and his stance a little stiffer, it was Silas, all right. Somehow still in one piece.

It was a goddamn miracle.

“There’s still not a mark on you,” Payne observed.

The kid spoke up. “You know him?” Ah, maybe the boy wasn’t a fool after all.

Silas smirked. “Fuck yourself, Payne.”

Payne smiled. It was going to take more than that to wound him.

“I’ve tried. Believe me, I have tried.” He took a sip of whatever swill the boy had handed him and set down the empty cup. “That’s damn fine coffee.” Then he filled it up with absinthe.

“It’s tea.”

Payne was noticing a pattern of Silas saying nothing in response to the kid. It was funny, really, when he considered what Silas himself had once been like. Not so prim and proper as this boy, but with a curiosity always gleaming behind his eyes, a sense of creativity. Young Silas said the strangest shit. And then there was that pesky moral compass of his.

He wondered whether Silas had grown out of that yet.

Payne handed one glass to Silas, another to the kid. “There you are. To bad times in the green hour.” Silas tipped his glass back, and Payne very carefully did not partake. The kid was eyeing his with uncertainty. “Down it boy, it’s liquid joy.” He was still hesitant, but he took a sip. Good. “You headed west?” Payne directed his question to the kid.

Silas spoke up for him instead. “North.”

Ah, so this was a game. Payne could play along. “Yeah, I’m headed…uh…south. The chill. Can’t stand it. It makes my joints ache.”

He flexed his pointer finger, squeaking out a croak with each stretch. Kneeling down in front of the boy, Payne could practically feel Silas stiffen behind him. So maybe he was being a bit childish, a bit petty…but didn’t Silas deserve it?

The boy’s blue eyes were wide with fear as he watched Payne come closer. “So why north, kid? Someone special?” The boy swallowed but said nothing. “Your sweetheart, maybe?” Silas inched closer, and the boy shifted uncomfortably, looking away.

So, that wasn’t going to work.

“Hey. I’m teasing, I’m teasing. You must be born on a Sunday, huh?” The boy wouldn’t make eye contact with him, silent. Jesus, was this kid capable of saying anything except correcting him on what was in his damn cup? Payne made the sign of the cross in front of the boy’s head, and he swear he thought he saw him tremble. “You born on a Sunday?”

The kid’s voice was hushed. “I don’t know.”

Payne turned his attention to Silas instead. “So, it’s fortunate that you’re headed north, cuz west…it’s bad. Big trouble. Big storm coming.”

Payne poured another drink.

“Easy, Payne.” Silas’s voice was rough, a warning. “He’s just a kid.”

There was once a point when Silas himself had been just a kid — and Payne, too, he supposed — but no one stayed pure for long. Not anymore. “No, he’s not. He’s an outlaw. Just like us.”

So, Payne made another toast. And another, and another. He was familiar enough with Silas to know when he was growing tipsy, and then drunk, and then to another level entirely.

But once Silas and the boy got up, standing on unsteady feet and wielding their pistols with inebriated abandon, Payne began to acknowledge that he might have made a mistake. Maybe absinthe was too strong a drink, or maybe he shouldn’t have poured that last glass. Whatever it was, Silas was long gone — it wasn’t going to work this way.

The boy stumbled off to piss — finally — and Payne seized his opportunity.

“Easy to see how you two crossed paths,” he called out to Silas. “One’s a falling angel, the other’s a rising devil.”

Silas’s voice was thick, his words slurred. “I’m no angel.”

And that sentiment might have made Payne laugh had Silas not plummeted over a log at that moment. Now _that_ was funny.

“True.” Payne stood and reached down to help Silas up, but the man was still unsteady, his limbs heavy and wild, so he held him close.

It was now or never.

“You think that’s a smart play?” Payne said. “Teaming up with him? Quicker than tracking him — simpler.”

“Ain’t no play about it.”

Payne had to stifle a laugh. Silas was not a good liar, especially not when he was stone-cold drunk.

“Yeah, I guess if you knew where Rose and Daddy was, you’d be done babysitting.” If Silas was surprised by how much Payne knew, it wasn’t evident on his face. He kept his eyes, slightly crossed, averted.

There was no way he was getting anything out him — not now. And Payne had to admit that maybe he’d underestimated Silas. Even after all this time, even after he’d vowed never to do it again, he hadn’t quite anticipated this.

“Never was a bean spiller, was you?” Payne said in admiration. “Not sober, nor liquored up. Never was.” One last try. “What are you gonna do with $2,000? Hmm?”

Payne couldn’t quite put his finger on what had been irking him about this quarry. He and the gang had been tracking Silas and the boy for several days, and whenever Payne caught sight of him, a little ache pinched at his heart.

Maybe it wasn’t so much that Silas was beating him to the bounty. Maybe it was just that Silas was still off on his own. Not needing them.

Not needing him.

“Come back to us.” Payne held Silas’s head between his hands, bringing the man’s eyes to finally meet his.

One last try.

“I’m not like you, Payne.” The grumbling voice was quickly followed by a click, and Payne glanced down to see Silas’s pistol leveled at him, his thumb on the hammer.

And instantly, it was ten years ago, and Payne was on the other end of another gun in Silas’s hand. The wound on his side burned where the bullet had grazed him, and the look in Silas’s eyes now was the same one he’d seen then — one he’d never forget. Anger. Bitterness. Hatred.

Payne released his hold, stepping backward into the darkness. He hoped the fear didn’t show on his face, but he couldn’t be sure.

**Author's Note:**

> Come talk to me on Tumblr at [ask-learningthetrees.tumblr.com](http://www.ask-learningthetrees.tumblr.com)!


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